


Dead Silence

by kimenem



Category: Supernatural, The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Crossover, Daryl and Dean would totally be friends, Gen, Language, Mild Gore, Minor Original Character(s), Original Character Death(s), Supernatural Summergen Fic Exchange
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-14
Updated: 2018-01-14
Packaged: 2019-03-04 17:18:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,738
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13369458
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kimenem/pseuds/kimenem
Summary: Sam and Dean thought zombie rumors were nothing to worry about. Until the whole world went crazy and their usual supernatural enemies fell silent. Surviving this new landscape is wearing them thin. Maybe a man with a crossbow is just what they need.





	Dead Silence

**Author's Note:**

  * For [tabaqui](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tabaqui/gifts).



> Originally written for Supernatural Summergen fic exchange in 2013. I revamped it to post here. Tabaqui requested a SPN/Walking Dead crossover. The only things you need to know about the Walking Dead are that a walker bite is infectious and Daryl is a main character from the show. For Supernatural, you just need to know that Sam and Dean are brothers who fight supernatural things.
> 
> Set mid-season 8 of Supernatural, and after Season 3 of Walking Dead. Sprinkled with OC’s.

If the internet still existed, Dean Winchester would be searching for the technical term for ‘certain noises make me want to punch everyone in the face’. He’s sure there’s got to be a word for that. 

Perhaps it was the years of hyper vigilance, trying to protect his family. Sleeping with one hand on a gun and his ears still tuned to the world around him. Or maybe it was listening to his brother crunch his way through a bag of chips on a never-ending road trip. Whatever the cause, he feels ruined now. Standing in the woods, with fading light, his ears overly alert, he’s waiting for any additional wheeze and rasp around him. It makes him feel like he’s going to crawl out of his own skin any second. And he still wants to punch everyone in the face. 

"Dean, where the hell are you, man?”

Sam's voice blessedly cuts through his thoughts. Dean hones in on the noise of Sam pushing through the dense brush and coming out into the clearing where he stands.

"Shit, that's a mess," Sam says, staring at the two walkers at Dean’s feet. The bodies no longer have much distinguishable shape. "We need to go, Nelly and Gregg aren't looking so good. I saw a cabin or shed out of the corner of my eye when we were running just now. It's worth checking out. We’re losing light too fast."

Dean focuses on Sam instead of the tingle in his skin. "All right, let's move.”

Together they push back into the dense foliage. Dean keeps his eyes on his brother and his ears tuned to the surrounding shadows.

\--------------------------------------

Sam and Dean reach their group - _family_ , Dean thinks. A quick glance shows him that all are still standing, though it’s clear it won’t be for much longer. They are all looking to him for the next move. He meets each person’s eyes and wishes they could read his mind and know how much he wants them to survive. And how sorry he is that one by one, they will eventually fall. 

“We should head back south,” he says, more confident than he feels. “Sam thought he saw something a ways back.” Then he’s already moving. 

"Stop right there, young man." Nelly Jones’ commanding voice seems more strained than normal. "What do you think you’re doing?”

He stops in his tracks, rolls his eyes, and turns to face the silver-haired spitfire. “I’m trying to get us to safety for the night, Nelly, before your expiration date. You got something to say before we continue? Should we sit down and break out the knitting needles? Gossip awhile first?

Nelly smirks. "I may be well past 60, but for the love of God, Dean, you'd never catch me knitting." 

He allows himself to smile for a second, thankful for the gift of Nelly. Dean has marveled more than once at her uncanny ability of keeping him from slipping too deep into his own head.

"Now, quilting," Nelly continues, "that's where the skill and talent comes in."

"Oh for fuck’s sake, Nelly, can we just-"

"Dean." Sam's voice reels him back in, again. "You're bleeding. Nelly just wants to patch you up before we go on." The concern and fear in Sam's eyes is unmasked, even as he tries to keep his voice steady. 

Looking down, Dean sees red rolling down and dripping off of his hand. Bright red, only now showing up over the brackish layers of grime he’s layered in. Looking back up, he can see that everyone is frozen, staring at him. Like he’s a dead man. 

Nelly keeps her eyes locked with his, unwavering. Sam’s hands are moving, trying to find the source.

“Don’t worry about it. We need to move.” He tries to shrug Sam off. Doesn’t want the attention. He doesn’t want to know the answer. 

Nelly’s eyes go wide. A snarl and a raspy wheeze has Dean turning and his arms flying on autopilot. He can hear Sam struggle beside him. _Stab. Slash._ He adds another layer of goo to his clothes before turning to jump into the fray of bodies he calls his group. His family. 

Before he can reach them, a cold, slippery hand clamps down on his neck. The clumsy walker has all the forward momentum and Dean stumbles and falls backwards under the weight of this particularly large flesh eater, his knife trapped and useless between him and the walker.

_This is it_ , he thinks. He’s going to die without much fanfare. No demons or angels interfering either way. He’s got his free arm up trying to keep the walker’s jaw from doing its damage, but the former human is huge. Dean knows he is losing this battle.  

A new sound breaks through the chaos. A high-pitched _whoosh_ comes through the air a split second after an arrow obliterates the head of the walker, narrowly missing Dean’s hands. He’s able to roll out from under the now re-dead body and find the source of his rescue. 

A man clad in grey and black and holding a kick-ass crossbow walks into view, obviously taking in the scene and weighing his options. Dean holds his breath, silently pleading with the stranger to have some fucking mercy and let his arrows fly. Dean can see the shift on the man’s face when he decides to commit to whatever he’s just walked into. 

It’s over in three minutes. That’s all it took to go from snarking about knitting with Nelly to standing over her body with Gregg’s sobs echoing through the woods. The other members of their group huddle around, in shock. Dean keeps his eyes on the man with crossbow, trying to decide whether to thank him, or tell him to turn away. He’s out of place at this particular scene. This funeral.  

Dean clears his throat and catches the man’s eye. “Thanks.” 

A small nod is all Dean gets. The man is done evaluating.

“You all need to move on. There’s a larger herd heading this way.”

Dean only nods back. There’s no time for the luxury of grieving. If they want to survive, they have to keep going. 

Sam must have heard the exchange between Dean and the stranger. Dean can hear him start to speak gently to their remaining group. The twins, the dentist, the angsty teen, the teacher, and the banker. And Gregg, who has just lost his wife of 40 years. After all they’ve survived, this doesn’t make sense. 

Dean keeps his eye on their savior. “We’re heading to a possible cabin, less than a mile back. Is that enough out of the way?”

“Yeah. That should work. But you have to move. Now.”

Dean finally breaks his connection and turns to help Sam shepherd their people. 

They have to pull Gregg away and stuff a rag in his mouth to keep him quiet enough from drawing attention. It feels cruel, but no one questions it. They start moving, Sam and Dean in the lead, along with the stranger keeping his crossbow up and ready. It doesn’t take long to find a dilapidated single-room cabin. A couple of chairs, a cot, a table and a few years’ worth of dust is not much, but enough. It’s not until they finish checking the area for threats and get inside that Dean remembers his bleeding arm. _Shit_. 

Sam, however, never forgot for one second, and before Dean knows what’s happening, his jacket and shirt have been removed. Sam doesn’t hide his relieved sigh when it turns out to be a small but deep puncture, probably from a tree limb. Not a bite. Sam’s head bows for a moment, maybe in a silent prayer of thanks. In Dean’s eyes, a prayer is a waste of time and breath. But he lets Sam have his moment and then turns to their unexpected ally. 

“I’m Dean. This is Sam.”

The man hesitates. “Daryl.” 

“We’re grateful you showed up. Thank you,” Sam says, having gathered himself, and offers his hand to Daryl. Daryl lets the hand hang in the air until Sam finally awkwardly drops it. 

“I can stay the night with you while you regroup. But you gotta keep quiet. The herd should pass and I’ll be on my way at dawn.” 

Dean nods. “Understood.” Daryl moves to take a dusty chair by the only window. 

While Sam finishes tending to Dean’s arm, he leans in and lowers his voice. “We should be careful, we don’t know this guy. He saved our asses, but he’s obviously not interested in becoming friends.”

“If he meant any harm he would have just left us to the walkers.” Dean sighs, tired. “But, you’re right, we should be careful. I’ll keep watch tonight. “

“No, you should rest. You’ve been amped up for days. When’s the last time you’ve actually slept?”

“I’ll be fine for one more night, Sam. I need you to look after Gregg and the others tonight.” Dean looks over at Gregg, crumpled on the cot. The others holding vigil. 

Sam doesn’t argue with him. They have to weather this blow if they want to survive. And it means holding each other up in these moments of respite. 

\--------------------------------------

Dark has fallen, and the sound of muffled crying is all that can be heard coming from the cabin. Dean and Daryl sit outside the door, having decided to keep watch together. Neither man trusting enough to allow the other to do it alone. 

“Are you out here by yourself?” Dean asks.

“In a way.” Daryl replies, and gives Dean a considering look. “How did you all end up together?”

Dean smiles before he can catch himself. “You’d never believe me.”

“Try me. We’ve got all night.”

Twenty minutes later Daryl is doubled over, silently laughing as Dean finishes his story in a whisper. 

“And I’ll tell you what, Nelly couldn’t have cared less what we all thought, standing there stark naked. You should have seen the look on Sam’s face. It was priceless, man.” He gives a final sigh as his grin fades. The sound of crying and sniffling is still coming through the door behind him. “Damn, I’m going to miss her.”

The men exchange a long look. Daryl says nothing, but Dean understands. There’s nothing he can say to make anything better.

“What about you and Sam?”

“What about us?

“You started the story with the two of you already together. You seem like you’ve seen some action. Did you serve together?

Dean waits a minute before answering. 

“Brothers, actually. But, yeah, we served, so to speak. Saw quite a bit of action. I was-” He stops, gives the man across from him a measured look. “This might be more unbelievable than the story about how we met the others.”

Daryl scans the trees around them and shrugs. “Can’t be any more unbelievable than walkers.”

“You might be surprised.” 

“I doubt it.”

“We were hunters.”

Daryl shrugs to show his indifference. “What’s so special about that?"

“Different kind of hunters. Ghosts, demons, evil spirits, the forces of hell. Things like _that_.”

They sit in silence for a minute before Dean continues. “You name it, we’ve fought it. Any nasty monster in legends or movies –it was all real. We were in the middle of a big showdown with the king of hell himself when the first rumors of zombies started. I thought we had seen it all. But this was something different. This wasn’t voodoo, or witchcraft. This disease or whatever it is obviously doesn't play by the same supernatural rules. It’s more organic. At first we thought it was a hybrid of a weird virus that some demons experimented with a while back. Or a new evolution of ghouls. But, nada. Nothing about this fits our wide and vast knowledge about a whole lot of crazy shit.”

An animal in the woods lets out a cry and both men are up with weapons ready before the cry fades. As silence falls again and no other movement or sound is evident, they both slowly sit again. Dean looks to Daryl and tries to read his face. 

“Think I’m nuts?”

“It doesn’t really matter what I think. Got no reason to doubt you so far, I guess. You’re saying there’s no connection between walkers and your, your monsters or whatever you hunt?

“We reached out to every supernatural connection we had. But everyone was running scared. Everything fell to the wayside as the epidemic spread. It wasn’t long before our world stopped being about demons and started being about walkers and survivors.”

“You think all that ghost stuff is over now?”

“God, I hope so. But probably not. I think the world has changed, and just like us the bad guys need to regroup or adapt or figure out how they survive too.  When I’m out there, when we’re moving, I’m not just looking out for walkers. I’m expecting anything and everything to be out to get me. Nothing’s safe. It’s a matter of time before things get worse. We thought hell was the lowest you could go. Turns out, it can always get worse.”

The night passes with hushed conversation about wendigos and demons. Daryl doesn’t want to be caught by surprise if it does turn out that walkers aren’t the worst things out there. Sometime while they are talking, a silence finally falls inside the cabin. Grief giving way to exhaustion. Daryl and Dean walk the perimeter of the cabin as the light of dawn breaks through the trees. 

“I had a brother, too.”

The confession startles Dean. And the past tense tells him enough.

“I’m sorry.”

“Yeah, well. I’m glad you and Sam still have each other.” 

Hanging his head, Dean releases a sigh and feels some of his pent up tension give up some ground. “Me too.”

Daryl stops and gives Dean a considering look one more time. “Stay safe,” he mutters as he turns and disappears into the woods. 

\--------------------------------------

“You told him everything?” Sam seems surprised. 

“Yeah, why not? Might do him some good in the future.”

Their group is on the move again. Movement equals life. Sitting and crying is a sure fire way to die.  

“Thanks for last night, Sam. You’re good with them.” He nods toward their weary family. 

Sam doesn’t respond and Dean can sense the worry from his brother. 

“We’re going to be fine, Sam, just gotta keep moving for now. We’ll find a place soon where we can stop for a while.”

“Did Daryl know anyone? Did he have any leads?” Sam sounds hopeful and it makes Dean’s heart ache in his chest. 

“Nothing he was willing to share.” 

A breaking twig and a soft ‘ho’ stops their march forward. No rasp, no wheeze. Daryl steps out into their path. After a long measured look at their barely-holding-it-together group, he finally speaks. “I might have lied earlier. I know some people. Good people.”

“Well I’ll be damned,” Dean says, a smile starting to break out on his face. “These people happen to be willing to make new friends?”

Daryl tilts his head. “Depends.”

“On what?” Sam questions, eager to know what the hell is going on.

Daryl turns to address Sam. “On how well your brother scored in grade school on ‘plays nice with others’.”

The sound of Sam laughing has become so rare, it shocks Dean to hear it now.

“I guess we’re shit out of luck then,” Sam replies through his grin. “Dean, I told you your grades were going to come back and bite you someday.”

“Oh, shut up,” Dean says, faking exasperation. He wants to hear Sam laugh again, tries to think of something to say. He comes up short. 

Turning back to Daryl, he fixes him with a look he hopes communicates both his thankfulness and his patented ‘don’t fuck with us’ attitude. “Considering we don’t know how well you or your friends scored in that area, how about we agree to make some introductions and see where this leads us?”

“Good enough. Let’s move.”

Sam and Dean turn and walk towards what they hope is a new and better chapter in their current shitty existence. And they know it could very well end up being a disaster. 

Or it could be just what they need. 

Either way, Dean keeps his ears tuned to his surroundings, waiting for the silence to give way. 

**Author's Note:**

> Comments and kudos are super appreciated!
> 
> Also, there is a word for what Dean wants to google - it's [Misophonia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Misophonia). The struggle is real!


End file.
